Last night's receipt of scientific data from Mars Pathfinder was delayed until tonight due to minor ground station problems that interfered with capturing all of Pathfinder's radio transmissions, mission engineers said today.
A short downlink opportunity and a problem with ground station computers combined to prevent most of Pathfinder's scientific data from being received last night. But engineering data from the rover and lander show that both remain in excellent health as they completed the first day of their third week on the surface of Mars.
"All the telemetry from the lander and rover continue to show that we have two very healthy spacecraft," said project manager Brian Muirhead. "We successfully completed the rover's seven-day prime mission and have finished the first week of its extended mission, and we are half-way through the lander's 30-day prime mission. Everything looks good for continued operations with outstanding science return from both lander and rover," he said.
Last night's scheduled science data return will be retransmitted during the next Mars day, Sol 16, which begins tonight. Engineers also plan to send a new software patch to remove the software bug that had caused the lander's computer to reset itself earlier in the mission. The next downlink session is scheduled to include images of the Martian moon Phobos, along with observations of early morning fog, measurements of the rock Scoobie Doo and images of various features around the lander.
Mission engineers said that overnight, Sojourner had successfully executed commands to move its wheels to scrape off the top layer of dust from the rock Scoobie Doo. The rover's spectrometer was to have then repositioned its sensor to measure the newly revealed surface of the rock. The extended sensor head, however, apparently overshot the edge of the rock and did not make contact. Engineers will analyze data on the position of the rover and its spectrometer and plan to reposition the instrument tonight.
On this Martian Day, Sol 15, Earth rise was at 6:07 p.m. PDT yesterday, sunrise was at 9:55 p.m. PDT, Earth set was at 8:25 a.m. PDT and sunset was at 10:51 a.m. PDT. The day's total data return from the Mars station was 2 megabits.
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